II. SURFER vs. CUSTOMER
One of the first factors we focus on is what many loosely refer to as the "surfer". Things have definitely changed and the surfer from just a few years ago has evolved into a very sophisticated potential customer with a discerning eye for bullshit, scams, phishing and the like. If there's any hint of dishonesty the customer is gone - never to return. The surfer has indeed evolved and we must evolve with them or loose them forever. The first step in our evolution is to respect the customer as a "customer" and no longer the derogatory surfer. The customer is the key component in our transaction. Without the customer there is no business. Start to think like a customer and evaluate your own product(s) - would you join? Would you rebill? Consider what the customer wants to see and create that environment whatever it takes and you will see the difference in your bottom line, even in a tough economy you might be down but certainly not out! Taking into account obvious economic and other factors the solo girl niche is as competitive today as it ever has been. It's nearly impossible to throw up a web site with a dozen photosets and videos, no updates, no involvement from the model, call it a solo site and expect success. Program owners are faced with the daunting challenge of constantly adapting to an ever-changing landscape or closing their doors forever. Photo content, by itself, is static and cliche. Although to a lesser extent the same holds true for video content. The million dollar question right now is "what does the customer want that they're still willing to actually pay for?"
III. RIDES vs. MOVIES
Solo girl sites tend to offer a static "movie" type of experience. "This is what we offer - watch it whenever you like - as many times as you please" and that can get boring very quickly unless the site is flooded with new content almost daily (ergo a tube-type model). Rather than a movie, if your focus is on creating an amusement park "ride" per se, then each person takes away something unique for themselves after each visit. It can be described and shared in a limited way but never truly appreciated until you experience the ride for yourself. This is what sets apart the garden variety site from a viral explosion!
Kate Ground and
Tawnee Stone are just two early examples of explosions that set the bar for solo girl sites and helped to formulate the niche into what it is today. They provided lots of exclusive content and that used to be enough. In fact the only obstacles back then to a customer saving all the .zips and videos at their convenience were low bandwidth capabilities, limited storage devices and inferior streaming or CoDec technology. Streaming is old hat now. Similarly storage and bandwidth are less expensive and getting cheaper every day! Everyone has a giant gigabyte or terabyte external as well so for a customer to login and download all of your material, cancel and move on the the next site is painfully easy anymore and the first real hard-knock lesson many new site owners learn. The question then becomes what can we, as a business, provide our customers that transcends the downloadable file dynamic? The answer is quite simply a fun ride! Very early iterations of this concept were the proto-personality sites of
Next Door Nikki and
Raven Riley. That idea began incorporating components, beyond simply content, into the web site intended to create an atmosphere or experience. Eventually as the personality site model permeated throughout the Internet web sites which continued to only provide static content appeared obsolete next to these newly enhanced web sites. We're beginning to see hints of the evolutionary next step in the solo girl site model in the form of reality-tv meets integrated social networks meets customer participation.
Natalie Sins and
Got Gisele are two great examples of this. Today we look for models that don't just shoot content but tweet, facebook, blog, make live appearances at events and meet and greet fans to name a few of the real-world things successful models are doing today. The mental fantasies of the last generation that drove those customers to signup are no longer enough. The new fantasy is a virtual relationship with the girl perpetuated by her responding to customer messages, requests and comments via livecams or direct responses. Anything and everything that feeds into the fantasy is golden = monetizes! After all what we're really talking about here is the dove-tailing of two individual markets = the internet web site and the fetish role-playing world. Today we can accomplish this merger in a "live site" version 1 let's call it. The models role-play an interested, flirtatious pseudo-friend and the customer a charming, true friend who just cares about her well-being.